Partnership
by coffeebuddha
Summary: Sometimes Jenny thinks that Kevin and Esposito have to be the only two people who don't notice the way they act around each other. Preslash.


Kevin may be the trained detective, but Jenny isn't stupid. She honestly thinks it's as simple as him not noticing, even though it's obvious to anyone with eyes that there's something going on. At first she'd thought it was cute, something to joke with her friends about. Her boyfriend, the macho homicide detective with a guy crush on his partner. A "bromance". Harmless, right?

Jenny sits curled up on Kevin's garish red couch with her feet tucked up underneath her, and she doesn't even try to catch the afghan they'd been sharing as it slips further off her lap to pool on the floor. The movie is paused, the screen frozen on a shot of Sandra Bullock moving a love seat with Bill Pullman. She takes a sip of her tea and listens to the rise and fall of Kevin's voice from the next room. The words are muffled, indistinct, but she recognizes the tone. He hadn't said the call was from Esposito, but if his expression hadn't been enough of a clue-the man lights up like Times Square on New Year's Eve at the mention of his name-the undercurrent of affection and excitement in his voice would be. The first time she'd noticed it creep up while he was talking about his partner, it had made her smile. She'd been happy to know that he was working with someone he so obviously cared about.

Except.

Except there's camaraderie, and then there's whatever's going on between Kevin and Esposito. She sees him out of the corner of her eye as he paces past the door, catches a few words of their conversation that do nothing to tell her what they're talking about. His beautiful blue eyes, the eyes that had first made her fall in love with him, are bright, and his smile is stretched so wide that it looks like it should hurt, and she tries to remind herself that he loves her. Esposito's nothing to them. He's a colleague, a work partner. She's Kevin's life partner; the person he chose to pair himself with, not the person who was assigned to him.

He's not cheating on her, she tells herself firmly, inhaling the soothing steam that wafts up from her mug. Kevin isn't capable of that. Besides, she's seen the two of them together. They don't have the kind of body language of two people who've been physically intimate. But they aren't innocent either. Jenny takes a deep breath and taps her fingernails against the warm ceramic, unable to dismiss her thoughts. There's a tension between them that nearly makes the air crackle when they're together. Their closeness shouldn't bother her, but everything from the way the world seems to narrow down to just the two of them when they talk-even their simplest conversations are full of inside jokes that make her feel like an outsider-to coming home and finding them propping each other up on the couch after another video game marathon, makes her skin prickle with apprehension.

Jenny takes another sip of her tea and it settles like heavy lead low in her belly. Kevin's a good, honest man. She could have a storybook romance with him, complete with the white picket fence and 2.4 children. Sometimes she thinks that there's nothing she could ask for that he wouldn't go out of his way to give to her. He would never lie to her, never lead her on, never hurt her. Not deliberately. She believes him when he tells her he loves her. His eyes are so gentle when he looks at her, and his touch is almost reverent whenever he reaches out for her. He's more considerate than any man she's ever been with. She's talked to a few other girls who got involved with cops. She knows how easy it would be for him to get wrapped up in his work and ignore her, but he's never done that. In fact, she doesn't think it's ever even occurred to him that he has an excuse for forgetting to call and check in.

He loves her. He does.

She just doesn't think he's noticed yet that he loves his partner more.

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**Thank you for reading! Feedback is overwhelmingly appreciated.**

This is my first fic for Castle. Please be gentle?**  
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